Understanding the Thick and Thin of Watercolor with Steve Griggs
Steve Griggs (Ep.59) loves watercolor because of its incredible versatility. But only, the artist warns, if your paints are ready to do the heavy lifting.
When it comes to watercolor, viscosity is the name of the game. Viscosity is how thick or thin your paint is.
Viscosity changes based on the ratio of pigment to water in your mixture.
In watercolor it's especially important because the more water you have and the less pigment you have, the weaker your color is going to be.
Sometimes you want this, but Griggs often sees his students working with just a very limited range of viscosity… primarily the very thinned down paint that has the consistency of tea.
Griggs points out that there are three viscosities critical to the medium:
(1) Yogurt
(2) Heavy Cream
(3) 2% Milk
Put it to Practice:
The way you get mixtures that are yogurt, heavy cream or 2% milk is by lowering the amount of water and raising the amount of pigment in your physical paint mixtures.
But you’ll need to make sure that your palette pigment is ready for this.
If you start with freshly squeezed paints, you’ll be ready to go.
If you’re starting with non freshly squeezed paint, you’ll need to make sure that they are still moist enough to get the full watercolor range.
If you’re using high quality professional grade cakes, Griggs recommends the following: The night before you paint, use your spray bottle to spray down the pigments. Then cover your cakes and in the morning, they should be more ready to work with.
If you’re using tube paints (but not freshly squeezed), spritz them about 20 minutes prior to working. Cover them up and then come back to test them.
If they are still hard, then it maybe be time to clean out your palette and begin again with fresh paint. You’ll never be able to get the thicker viscosities and therefore, won’t be able to access the deep, rich colors that watercolor offers.